


Confessions

by little_abyss



Series: Sadness Appreciation Society Works [3]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening
Genre: F/M, Hurt No Comfort, Love Confessions, Possibly Unrequited Love, Reaction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-01
Updated: 2017-10-01
Packaged: 2019-01-07 11:05:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12231561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/little_abyss/pseuds/little_abyss
Summary: Nathaniel makes an unwelcome confession on the battlements of the Keep.A fill for the Sadness Appreciation Society prompt:unrequited love





	Confessions

She grinds her teeth, looking away from him. Evune waxes fat and brilliant yellow in the sky above the battlements, Satina dull and sickly by comparison.  Why should she care what he says?  It’s just words, and words are…  The wind moans softly in the crenellations, but even that sounds like a false promise to Velanna.  She swallows, suddenly nervous.

Mythal’s mercy, this is  _ stupid _ .  Why is she even entertaining this?  Her heart thuds in her chest, her head swims, her knees feel weak.  But… but… it’s  _ Nathaniel _ .  And he’s… Velanna sighs in annoyance.  Why him?  Nathaniel Howe seems like, he seems… clownish, ridiculous, really, with his… his platitudes and his politeness.  He’s just… just… so very… And there’s no way he could mean that.  Those words.   _ Velanna… I’m… I think I love you. _

 

_ Don’t _ , she tells herself angrily,  _ he’s a shemlen.  Don’t think that because the wolf says  _ I love you _ that it won’t eat you up.  Don’t be fooled.  He wants something, that’s all this is.  Don’t look for comfort where all there is is pain. _

 

And then… it’s such a small sound, but it’s there.  She looks at Nathaniel again, and he blinks at her in the moonlight, clenches his jaw and swallows loudly again.  “I…” he croaks, and clears his throat, ducking his head a little as he does, then looks at her pleadingly, his mouth opening once more.  

Velanna lifts her chin.  “Hold your tongue, Warden Howe.  I have given you no cause to love me.  This is a fancy, nothing more.”

Nathaniel stiffens, his nostrils flaring, and Velanna’s guts churn.  She lifts a hand and stares at him belligerently, “If you would lay with me, then say that.  But do not think to spin me these stories and have me fall into your arms like a ripe peach.”  She glares at him and folds her arms.  “Out of my way.  I have the northern tower to watch.”

 

Nathaniel sucks in a short breath and holds it, then nods curtly, shifting aside.  For a moment, Velanna waits, expecting him to put up a fight.  But he will not meet her eyes, and she can feel the silence passing into strangeness, so she stalks forward, brushing past him on her way to the stairs.  And if she draws a deeper breath as she passes, if she feels the bitter coil of regret at his scent of leather and faint tobacco and him, just him, then she does not show it.


End file.
